An Injury Prone Day with the Best Views, My El Nido Boat Day

My third stop on my tour of the Philippines is the island of Palawan, specifically the city of El Nido. So far I've been lucky to have escaped the worse of rainy season... up until this city. So, to make reading about my time here more enjoyable for you, I chose to write about my most eventful day here, which happened to be my first full day in El Nido. I wanted to do a boat tour to see the spectacles this place offers, and the best way to do that is by boat.

I ended up spending almost a week in El Nido, and maybe had 2 days of partial sun. Knowing that I got the big sights out of the way at the beginning of the trip, I used the rest of my time in El Nido for some R&R, really embracing the chill beach vibes this island offers. But first, to tell you about my boat day, let's keep going on these Philippines tales.

August 27th

I went on Tour A today!! I am glad that I did the boat trip because little would I discover that it would rain the rest of the time I’m in El Nido. Nothing you can do about the weather, but I am glad I seized the opportunity when I did. I got a smoothie bowl for breakfast, gave my laundry to the store next door, and then met Liv and Grace as they were also joining me on the boat trip (two friends I made the night before!). It started at 9am and we were ready to go by then. 

In order to get to our boat, we had to wade into the water and for quite a way. The tide must have been too low to even meet us half way, as we drudged through some weedy mushy sand. After our little water walk, we got to the baby boat that took us to the bigger boat. Only in Asia lol. We were the first group to make our way to the boat. A second group joined us after and in total there were 8 of us.

The stops were unique. There were a lot of park the boat and go snorkeling type of spots. So you could probably guess, our first stop was to snorkel. I wanted to swim to the nearby beach, it was pretty close and I knew it wouldn’t be that hard. Plus, it seemed more fun than snorkeling to me personally. I was on my way there when the water started to feel a bit odd, it felt like I was swimming through squishy beads. It was the oddest feeling, to the point it piqued my curiosity enough to try and pick it up in my hand to see if it was a plant or animal. But, it was clear and I couldn’t get a good grip of it, but I did know that it was a strange texture and it would sometimes give you a little sting.

It felt really weird to be swimming in them, and once the stinging happened more and more often, that's when I aborted. I started swimming back when another boat member, JC, was swimming towards me, so I thought I would just ask him to see what exactly he thought these things were. Turns out it was little plankton. Nothing as bad as a jellyfish, they were little clear bubbles with a few dots of orange to make them visible, but there were millions of them. And they weren’t harmless, they did have a bit of a sting to them if you were swimming through a patch of them. I thought if JC could swim through it, maybe I could try again because I really wanted to get to this beach. But, when he was turning around because the swarm of plankton was that thick, I sprint swam as well back to the boat. It wasn’t that serious but it was just such an odd feeling and the occasional sting/bit was just rather annoying.

There wasn’t much more to do at this stop besides swim and snorkel, and when the plankton kicked me out, I guess my next option was to enjoy the boat from the upper deck. I joined Grace and Liv up there, and the others joined us as well. I even sat down and then people sat around me, specifically JC, and two girls from Nepal. The staff passed around juice with alcohol, I said I was allergic to alcohol because I didn’t want to try to be swayed lol so they gave me plain pineapple juice.

Our next stop was to the main attraction which was the Big Lagoon. Here you kayak into the Lagoon and around it to get the full sight of it. I got paired up with the other solo traveler, a man from India but recently moved to Australia. For some reason, our kayak only had one paddle and because he was in the back due to proper weight distribution, he was the one in charge of paddling and I was the passenger princess. He was struggling paddling into the lagoon from the boat, but once we got into the lagoon it got easier.

We got to a beach area in the lagoon where he pulled us over, we took some photos, and then he asked if I could paddle. So, I hopped in the back and paddled for a while. I didn’t mind, but I liked being in the front more and not having to do anything, but I guess I can help the fatigued lad out. I was just strolling about the place, unsure how much time we had. I paddled us into the middle area and down the side. We would stop a lot to admire the views, I was in no rush to speed in this lagoon. But my homie had another idea in mind. 

We ran into people from our tour group and my partner asked to borrow a paddle so that he could help me out. I really didn’t mind taking us around but I thought the extra help wouldn’t be bad. It was bad. My partner wanted to zip through this lagoon for no apparent reason. He had no sense of direction even though he was in the front and I was supposed to be the muscle power in the back but I was in no rush and it wasn’t worth breaking my back when most of what we were there to see we could see just by turning our heads. But the guy paddled hard in the front, almost dragging me, and then we would come close to colliding with other kayaks or the rock wall surrounding us that I would have to paddle backwards in order to realign us. This wasn’t going as planned, not as idyllic as I was hoping. 

It got worse when our tour guide that was also out on a kayak told us to go through a narrow pass. It was really tight but my partner for some odd reason tried to zip through this nook. I thought we should probably go slow but he was paddling so hard. I just wanted to pause to get a photo but he was zooming. I had to be cautious because it was a tight squeeze. We got to one of the narrowest points and we were attacking it full speed because they guy could not catch a break. He wasn’t prepared to have to squeeze past it, catching him off guard that the wall pinched his paddle and it swung backwards and knocked me in the jaw. Yes, you heard that correctly, this man just hit me in the face with his paddle. On top of everything, it hit the sensitive part of my jaw where I had my allergic reaction to mint a few days prior and it was still sore and swollen from that. 

You can probably guess I wasn’t a happy camper when the paddle met my face. At least that was our last bit of time in the lagoon and we made our way back to the boat. Beautiful lagoon with an eventful spin.

Our next stop was lunch. I told them I was vegan beforehand and they were well prepared for that. I couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw two different tofu dishes let alone one. There was also rice and fruit. I ate so much because I couldn’t pass up the free protein and I had a feeling my dinner plan would be late so this would tie me over in the meantime. The boat really only stopped there for lunch, we could’ve swam if we wanted to, but with full bellies no one really wanted to leave the boat, me included. So, we set off for our next stop, another snorkeling point. 

I really liked this stop for two reasons. One, I checked something off my summer experience list, and two, the view from the boat was actually incredible. I wasn’t planning on snorkeling until one of the boat crew said they spotted a sea turtle. Despite having to swim through the stinging plankton, I would not pass up the opportunity to see a sea turtle in the ocean. I strapped up, jumped in, and in olympic record time I was through the pool of plankton and floating just about the majestic sea turtle. It was the coolest thing I’ve seen while snorkeling this summer. It reminded me of my favorite animal, the giraffe. The reason I love these two animals is their peaceful cadence and stroll, this turtle just slowly making his way along the ocean floor, in no rush and purely observing, enjoying the nature around him. I loved watching him do his thing in the wild, I felt as though I discovered my new spirit animal. I stayed watching him as long as I could, until he snuck under some coral and my fellow boat friends had also made their way back so I was the only one left watching. 

I had to cross through the family of plankton, so just like my way there, I sped across the water to get right back to the boat. There weren’t many by the boat thankfully, I did get zapped when crossing through the dense area of them, but I was safe by the boat. I swam nearby for a while, but then eventually hopped in the boat because I realized how gorgeous our view was and I wanted to get some photos before our departure from it. 

I went to the top deck, where I looked out at the little beach and the rock formations surrounding it. So far, El Nido has reminded me exactly of Krabi in the appearance of the nature. From the top deck I was admiring the rocks and ocean but also had my eye on the boat crew as they grabbed a couple lines and went squid fishing. The crew is hilarious because they pull so many pranks on each other, absolutely had no intention of maintaining any professionalism, them messing around more than us. They would throw each other into the water, hit each other with flippers, laugh from their stomach at each other, and have the highest spirits. One of them pushed the other in the ocean and so his fishing line got lost when he fell in the water. And the other line was lost when they guy accidentally let go of the base when trying to cast the line. We spent I think longer than we should have waiting for the guy to snorkel around on the hunt for the line. I don’t know how he thought he would find it in the ocean with the current likely taking it far away from the boat, but they had hope and looked for it for almost 15 minutes. Again, their pranks, they started driving the boat away when two guys were swimming back, so they had to kick it into high gear to catch the boat, and they did, but when they got on they were panting. 

Our last stop was the beach. Our main activity here was volleyball. I was excited to play, it wasn’t very official because the net was very low, but that made it easier for the for the shorter ones, me included. All the staff played and about half of the guests played. I was center back, in between two beginners so that meant I got a lot of the balls that required some movement. The serves were challenging and good, making the game more exciting. We won 25-21, huge dub, and the losers had to crawl under our legs, essentially the punishment was being sandy. 

We had tons of time on this island, so even after playing volleyball for over an hour, swimming for 30 minutes, I went over to the girls from Nepal as I was walking along the beach and they offered to take some photos of me. I found myself in complete luck because they were amazing photographers and the setting was perfect. How lovely. We stayed there for a while and picked through the sand for colorful seashells as we chatted, the two girls, me and JC joining us as well.

That was our last stop on the tour, it was pretty gloomy all day, the sun never coming out, but thankfully only light rain here and there. I really wanted to see what this water looked like on a sunny day, but I would have to save that experience for next time. We made our way back to hostel, I was all bruised up upon return, for one additional reason. As I was hopping into the boat to leave the last island, something rammed into my leg and the same to JC, it being odd that it happened to both of us, me first and then him. I just got bit by a territorial fish. I kid you not when it felt like someone swung a heavy bag at my calf and then just ran away. I didn’t think much of it except that I wanted to get out of the water asap after the day I had. 

When I got in the boat I realized that my leg was bleeding a little, and there was a cut that looked like an upside down V. That bugger got me good. I applied some pressure to get the bleeding to stop and decided I would treat it when I got back to the hostel knowing they would for sure have alcohol to sterilize it. It really wasn’t that big of a deal but just in case I might as well get it treated properly. On top of that I had the sore jaw from getting hit with the paddle, and I had little red bumps on my skin from the plankton stings. A good day but I certainly left with battle scars. 

I showered, got the leg sorted, and then my friends came in and I chatted with them until we left for dinner. We went to this fully vegan place that had a location in Siargao that I went to my last night there. We ordered our food, sharing bites and trying all of the dishes ordered. We had a lovely dinner, and walked around the city a bit. I was so full from trying all the food that I felt the heavy weight in my stomach. I wanted to just lie down. So, when we got back I did just that, much needed rest after an event packed day.